Between a customer placing an order and another channel showing the same stock, there are at most five minutes. In those five minutes a sales order has to be processed, the stock mutation has to be carried out, and every connected system has to know the new level.
That is the reality of stock synchronisation with Exact Online. It sounds tight. It is tight, provided you have the right connector, the right Exact Online package, and understand how the synchronisation works per scenario.
This article explains exactly what happens when a product is created, an order comes in, a return is processed or you draw on multiple warehouses. And why the answer differs per situation.
Exact Online offers two packages for companies that sell physical products. The naming is confusing, both have Handel in their name, but the capabilities differ considerably.
Handel (€23.95/month) synchronises in one direction. Orders, articles and stock levels go from your webshop to Exact Online. Your webshop is the starting point. Exact Online receives, registers and processes.
Handel ERP (€39.95+/month) adds two-way sync. Changes in Exact Online, such as a goods receipt, a stock correction or a price adjustment, flow automatically back to your webshop. And to Bol.com. And to Amazon. Every five minutes, in both directions.
That distinction sounds technical. The consequences are not.
Do you sell exclusively through your own webshop? No wholesale, no marketplace, no physical counter? Then Handel can be sufficient. Your webshop determines what is available. Exact Online keeps the accounts. The flow goes one way and that works.
The moment you add a second sales channel, such as a Bol.com connector, a B2B portal, a counter employee who books in Exact Online, you need two-way synchronisation. Without that feedback your webshop does not know what has been sold or received through other channels.
Handel ERP is not a luxury once your warehouse is managed from more than one place. A purchase order booked in Exact Online increases the stock in your webshop automatically. A manual correction by your warehouse employee? Visible in all sales channels within five minutes.
Without that synchronisation the stock discrepancies that cause overselling arise. Not through bad software, but because systems do not know each other's changes.
Where does an article start? That depends on your way of working and your package.
With Exact Online Handel you create the product in your webshop: WooCommerce, Shopify, Magento or Lightspeed, or another platform. The connector picks up the article, sends the data to Exact Online, and creates an article card there. SKU, description, price, VAT code: everything is copied over. Your webshop is the source.
With Exact Online Handel ERP it can also be the other way around. You create the article in Exact Online, including purchase price, supplier and cost centre, after which the connector automatically forwards it to your webshop. That makes more sense when your purchasing department works in Exact Online and your e-commerce team in the webshop.
In both cases the article exists in both systems after five minutes at most. No CSV upload, no manual entry, no copy-paste of article numbers.
This is the scenario that runs every minute at webshops with volume. A customer places an order. What happens?
The connector detects the new order at the next synchronisation cycle. The order is created as a sales order in Exact Online, including customer data, article lines, VAT calculation and payment status. At the same time the stock mutation is processed: the number of available units drops.
That drop is visible in all connected systems within five minutes. Does the same customer sell the last item through your Shopify store? Then your Bol.com listing shows the article as sold out before the next buyer clicks "order".
During peak periods around holidays, Black Friday, December sales or a viral social post those five minutes are the difference between controlled sell-out and dozens of oversells. You sell what you have. No more.
Returns are the litmus test for every stock connector. The parcel comes back. The employee checks the contents. And then?
With an approved return the stock has to be restored in three systems at once: in your warehouse (physically), in Exact Online (administratively) and in your webshop (commercially). If one link lags behind, you have a product that sits on the shelf but is not for sale. Lost revenue, without anyone noticing.
With Handel ERP this happens automatically. The return is processed in Exact Online: credit note, stock addition, any quality note, after which the connector sends the updated stock level back to all sales channels.
With Handel (one-way) you have to update the return stock in your webshop manually. That works with five returns per week. At fifty per week it is a full-time administrative task that is also prone to errors.
As soon as your stock is spread across more than one location, stock management becomes exponentially more complex. Which warehouse is drawn on for an order? How do you prevent location A from selling out while location B is overstocked?
Exact Online Handel ERP supports multi-warehouse stock management. Each warehouse has its own stock registration. The connector knows which warehouse belongs to which sales channel or which region, and draws on the right location.
An order from North Holland? The Alkmaar warehouse. A Bol.com order? The central DC. A B2B order for a specific customer? The dedicated storage point set up for that customer.
That routing happens based on rules you configure once. After that it runs automatically. The stock level per warehouse is always current: in Exact Online and in every sales channel connected to it.
With the basic Handel package you work with one stock location. For many webshops that is fine. But if you grow to multiple fulfilment points, then Handel ERP is the only route.
The connector does not move loose numbers. It is a complete dataset that is compared and updated every five minutes.
From webshop to Exact Online:
From Exact Online to webshop (Handel ERP only):
That feedback is what makes the difference. Without feedback Exact Online is a registration system. With feedback it is a control mechanism that drives your entire operation.
The question "Exact Online Handel or Handel ERP?" is not an IT decision. It is an operational consideration.
Do you sell through one channel, process returns manually and work from one location? Handel is sufficient and saves you €16 per month.
Do you sell through multiple channels, process returns in Exact Online, work with a purchasing department that creates articles in Exact, or use multiple warehouses? Then Handel ERP is not an upgrade, but a requirement. You earn back the price difference with the first oversell you prevent.
In both cases the synchronisation runs every five minutes. In both cases you do not have to type anything over manually. The difference lies in the direction of the data flow, and thus in the control you have over your stock.
The stock synchronisation with Exact Online works regardless of your webshop platform. WooCommerce, Shopify, Magento, Lightspeed: the connector is available for every platform and works identically. The same synchronisation frequency, the same field mapping, the same reliability.
Do you also sell through marketplaces? Bol.com and Amazon can be connected too. One central point in Exact Online, multiple sales channels that all show the same, current stock level.
More than 2,000 companies run on that infrastructure. ISO 27001 certified, synchronised every five minutes, without manual intervention.
Do the maths yourself. View our webshop connectors →